What is the purpose of this trial?

RATIONALE: Drugs used in chemotherapy work in different ways to stop the growth of cancer cells, either by killing the cells or by stopping them from dividing. Giving more than one drug (combination chemotherapy), giving the drugs in different doses, and giving the drugs in different combinations may kill more cancer cells.

PURPOSE: This partially randomized phase III clinical trial is studying different combinations of risk-adapted chemotherapy regimens and their side effects and comparing how well they work in treating younger patients with newly diagnosed standard-risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Participation Guidelines

Eligibility Criteria

B-ALL patients must be enrolled on AALL08B1 prior to treatment and enrollment on AALL093

Patients must have newly diagnosed NCI Standard Risk B-ALL or B-LLy Murphy Stages I or II patients with Down syndrome are also eligible

Note: For B-LLy patients with tissue available for flow cytometry, the criterion for diagnosis should be analogous to B-ALL for tissue processed by other means (i.e. paraffin blocks), the methodology and criteria for immunophenotypic analysis to establish the diagnosis of B-LLy defined by the submitting institution will be accepted

Meets the criteria for one of the following risk groups after induction therapy

How will my information be used?

When you express interest in a specific study, the information from your profile will be sent to the doctor conducting that study. If you're eligible to participate, you may be contacted by a nurse or study coordinator.

If you select a health category rather than a specific study, doctors who have active studies in that area may contact you to ask if you would like to participate.

In both cases, you will be contacted by the preferred method (email or phone) that you specified in your profile.